Rum, Lime, and Mint, But This is No Mojito

Feel free to skip right to the recipe if you don't want to read a bunch of blather about how cocktail recipes come to be. All that really matters is that this drink is wonderfully refreshing.

The easiest way to describe this drink would be to say that it is a Mojito with added cucumber and absinthe, served up. But the drink's inventor, Tom Walker of the American Bar at The Savoy Hotel in London, came to it from a different place.

Walker says his drink was inspirid by a The Maid, which was created by the talented Sam Ross (who is also the inventor of the Penicillin.) The Maid is a drink family with the combination of cucumber, mint, and citrus. If you add gin to it, you get an Old Maid. If you add bourbon, it's a Kentucky Maid. Walker added rum with some soda and absinthe.

As Bacardi rum has its roots in Cuba, Walker chose the name Maid in Cuba to pay tribute to the base spirit as well as the cocktail that inspired it.

Rinse the inside of a cocktail glass with absinthe and discard the extra. Add all but the last two ingredients to a cocktail shaker and muddle the cucumbers. Add ice, shake, and strain through a fine strainer (to remove most of the mint bits) into the cocktail glass. Add a tiny splash of soda water to give it some lift.